"liberals, being anti-military, refuse to serve and therefore have zero factual basis on which to discuss the military"

You think the only way to get facts about the military is to serve?

You think getting a boot-camp indoctrination in obedience is the best path to true understanding?

I'm sick of this nonsense. The least qualified to talk about the need for a standing military are the people who have a stake in it and the glory it implies. They ( you? ) hold themselves to be super-patriots above reproach, and of course they ( you? ) claim to be essential to all we hold dear.

"Maybe one day we can fully disarm, but not at this moment. "

*fully* disarm? This is not only stupid, but extremely unlikely. There's more alternatives then "trillion dollar war machine" or "no weapons at all."

"Iraq needs to be a semi-functioning state before we leave"

And who decides when that happens? And what if they have troubles afterward? and just why the hell do you think the American military can make that happen?

This is just arrogance. We can't "fix" other people's political problems, but it makes a great excuse.

"Afghanistan is cluster fuck mostly thanks to Bush, but before we call it quits it would wise to see what dividends a reinvigorated effort might bring."

More of the same. Apologetics for the Pentagon.

I'm not going to "thank you for your service," or hate you for it either. Sorry if you didn't enjoy your adventure in Iraq, more so if you did.

Just wondering, have you ever expressed online or off, an opinion about a military matter without mentioning your time in the Marines?

Ever found yourself saying something like "if you haven't been there, you know nothing," to someone who disagrees with you? Ever been tempted to?

I'm only asking because your post is thoughtful. I wouldn't ask this of someone I thought was a tool.

Seems to me that having been a Marine must be a powerful buttress to any opinion you express.

A fool who signs up to go to the other side of the world to kill people is an EVIL fool.

I'm sure most of the fools don't really think they're signing up to do that.

Not being religious, I don't find the word 'evil' to be useful for much beyond expressing a strong disapproval.

"Teenagers are quite capable of being evil monsters. Check out high school."

Semantics aside, fair enuf.

and don't call me 'dear', I ain't. :)

telling us "good point, but Bolling is just all about himself?"

Why don't free market fundamentalists really follow their belief that government should keep it's hands off the market? The biggest thing the government does has never been regulation, it's the laws protecting business owners, from liability, from untrustworthy partners, and from having to deal with employees fairly,"man to man."

A real "Free market" means:

1. Eliminate all corporate forms, C-corp, S-corp, LLC, all of em.

2. No business contracts or laws at all, period.

3. All business only citizen to citizen, completely unregulated.

Sure, there would be discord, but we have criminal laws for personal injury issues. But exploitation would be reduced when all business is citizen to citizen, not legally protected owner to legally vulnerable employee.

The government screws up everything? Then we don't need no stinking government protections for business! owners!

The only way America will be safe is to KILL EVERYONE ELSE IN THE WORLD!

Glad to see we're off to a good start.

The last president to issue a foreign-policy/military decision directly at odds with the oligarchy-military-security-industry was John Kennedy. Draw your own conclusion there.

A Prez that has strong, friendly connections with those powers ( GWB, fer instance ) has the power to push them around a bit ( as Rummy was famous for ), but by nature will agree with them on all important issues.

A Prez without ( Obama, Clinton ) must have other power bases ( Obama cozied up to Wall Street ) to get anything done, but *no* modern President will directly challenge the military-security-industry. Heck, Obama didn't even get to pick his own Secretary of War.

Them suckers want these wars ( sic ) to on a bit longer.

he's a venomous snake with no honour.

I'm tired of "The United States of Fear."

Robert Heinlien visited the U.S.S.R. in the late 70's and wrote a long essay echoing what others here saw; the Soviet boogyman was a chimera.

So why all the fear mongering from the establishment? Could it be power and money? Nah! Never!

And how am I supposed to be all afeared of the Big Bad Islamic Terrorists after being so disappointed by the last boogyman?

I found White's criticism to be reasonable and fairly accurate.

compared to some of the fine comments already posted.

"Without those neanderthal knuckle dragging cousin marrying southerners, we could be a great progressive country."

Yeah, but where would we get our cannon-fodder?

I figure all us really know deep down just how evil our military adventures really are, because an article like this one gets shouted down by a hundred angry denialists with apocryphal justifications ( like "the Taliban are cutting off teachers heads!!!" )

People who swallow years of military lies and then self-righteously put themselves forward as experts are just angry jackasses.

Silence.

An old business adage is to never ask a lawyer what to do, instead, tell the lawyer what you want to do and ask him if it's legal.

Following the advice of generals is a sure road to disaster.

"Chuck is definitely an intelligent person, compared to the "rising stars" of today's Republican party."

And this means....?

I too was wondering who this mysterious conservative intellectual might be.

Oh, it's not an intellectual at all! It's just Krauthammer.

haufenmist in the lead with 700 posts in 2 months.

Well, at least Salon is getting more ad revenue.